Eclipse Photography for Beginners

[OzEclipse]

Eclipse Photography for Beginners
By Joe Cali
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Warnings:
• Never look at the sun with your naked eye or through an optical device without eye protection from a certified* filter during an annular eclipse, partial eclipse or when the sun is not eclipsed.
• The photographic advice below applies only to photographing the sun when the sun is totally eclipsed. During totality, the period between the two diamond rings, when no filter is required. During a partial eclipse, annular eclipse, or full sun, special filtration is required.
• There is no danger to your eyes using a camera with a live view, where you are only viewing a video display.
• Looking at the sun’s surface through a DSLR without a filter, a camera with a mirror and an optical finder, can damage your eyes.

* Certified filters can be recognised if they have a statement printed on the packaging that they comply with the requirements of the ISO 12312-2 international standard.
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So, you're not an expert photographer. Maybe this is your first total solar eclipse, and you want to have some photos as a memento. Seasoned eclipse chasers will tell you to put away the camera and just look. Others will advise you to plan elaborate photographic projects. What do you do?
We've all marvelled at the inspirational images of expert eclipse photographers. Should you try to take your own pictures or just "borrow" the work of the experts?

If this is your first or second eclipse, I suggest you do a little of each. Some total eclipse photography is very easy and other types of images are very difficult to capture and process. Very easy because, providing you take off the lens cap and solar filter, almost any exposure will show some sort of image of the corona. This is because the corona spans an enormous brightness range. It is this brightness range that makes it so difficult to get expert level results. High-quality close-up photography of the corona is a significant technical challenge while wide-angle atmospheric images or single wide dynamic range telephoto images recording your experience are relatively easy to capture and process.

Here are three simple photographic projects that don't require anything more than a cell phone, compact digital camera, DLSR, film camera, or videocam and will leave you free most of the time to just enjoy the eclipse.


 
The elephant in the room
The big problem is that solar corona contains a huge variation in intensity from the inner corona to the outer corona. The brightness ratio from the inner to outer corona is about 12-13 photographic stops or 8000:1.

Film, can only record a brightness ratio of about 100:1. Some would argue much less. A typical digital sensor can record about 10-11 stops, some high-end cameras have a dynamic range of 13-14 stops, but even very skilled photographers won't necessarily convert this into a continuous range image of the corona without applying special HDR techniques. Your eyes can adjust and adapt to an enormous range of intensities. So, you can see it, but you can't capture it on film or digital camera very easily.

Your digital camera will have a dynamic range specification expressed in eV. Each 1eV is a factor of two, like doubling or halving the shutter speed, or changing the aperture setting from f2.8 to f4 to f5.6. All have the same effect. The important thing to remember, the biggest dynamic range is achieved at the lowest ISO setting where you will also get the lowest noise in your image. Noise is less of an issue these days with some of the advanced noise reduction software now available. So my recommendations below are all at capture setting of ISO 100.
 
Project 1. Wide Angle Landscape/Atmospheric Shot
Capture your own experience!
Equipment: Any camera: smartphone, digital compact or digital SLR
Dust off the old film camera, digital compact, cell phone or DSLR. Take the widest-angle lens you have. Set the camera on a tripod, stand or clamp. If you don’t have any of these, bring a towel, and a hardcover book. Open the hardcover as shown below and set your phone to selfie mode. This can be set up on your car hood, picnic table, wall capping, or the ground and the angle can be adjusted by opening or closing the book. Set the camera to selfie mode so that the display is facing you, visible and you can control the camera or video. If you set it up on the ground, make sure nobody can step on it while staring up.

1. Set the camera to auto mode.
2. Set the compensation control to -1eV.
3. Best results if you set the camera to Av mode and set the aperture to f5.6.
4. Set the ISO to the lowest setting ISO 100 or ISO 200 depending on the camera.
5. Compose on a tripod so that the Sun, the sea, and a big swathe of sky feature prominently in the frame.
6. Don't forget to include yourself in the photo.
7. Be careful you don’t block the eclipse!
8. Set the camera behind you to fire at regular intervals with an intervalometer, or by remote control.

Note: In some parts of Mexico and the USA, the eclipse will be very high up in the sky and you may need to orient the camera vertically (portrait).

Gobi Desert, August 1st 2008. The Sun is only 14o above the horizon. Taken with a 35mm film camera with an 18mm lens (equivalent to an APSc DSLR with a 12mm lens), -1 eV compensation, ISO 400 film, Av mode, f4. Taken at Jinta near Jiayuguan, Gansu Province. In this shot taken at totality, the Sun was in the west in the late afternoon. The eclipse over the USA in 2024 will be much higher altitude, more than 60 deg in the southern USA and around 50 deg – 60 deg in the northern USA.

Svalbard, March 20, 2015. Another low to the horizon eclipse. This wide-field view was captured seconds after totality began. The edge of the umbra can be seen just to the left of the eclipsed sun where the sky transitions from dark to light. APSc mirrorless camera on auto with -1.5eV.

Total eclipse, Idaho, August 21, 2017. APSc DSLR, 12-24mm zoom @15mm 2s, f4, ISO 100, -1eV compensation. This eclipse was high in the sky (50 deg) necessitating the use of a very wide-angle lens and no cropping was possible in post processing. This is the closest framing situation to the next solar eclipse in the USA in 2024. In hindsight, I should have included my own silhouette in this image, but this camera was off to one side operating unattended while I was at my telescope doing close-ups.

This ultrawide composite image is of an eclipse that has a 54 deg altitude. The composite was made with screenshot from a video frame with a fisheye lens for the landscape and sky and a HDR from a 135mm lens with a DSLR.

Wide-angle Still Image of the Eclipse, Sky and Landscape - Camera Settings Summary
DSLR/ Mirrorless
1. ISO 200
2. Exposure Mode: AUTO (Av)
3. Aperture Value (Av): f4
4. Shutter Speed AUTO from camera
5. Autofocus off*
6. Focus manually
7. Noise reduction on
8. Exposure Compensation Set to -1.5 eV

Compact Digital/ Cellphone
1. ISO: lowest value if it can be set manually.
2. Auto Exposure
3. Autofocus off if possible. *
4. Exposure Compensation Set to -1 eV

* Always turn off autofocus if possible and focus manually. In low light, autofocus will hunt for a target and possibly defocus your camera lens.


Project 2. Video using any handy cam, smartphone video, or DSLR video
I've seen many videos of total eclipses, some taken with very expensive video cameras. Skilled videographers can capture great video of eclipses. I am not one of them. There are a lot of very poor, shaky, and blown out closeup videos of coronas around. This shaking is caused by the photographers needing to fiddle with settings on the camera while imaging to attempt to zoom in and out and adjust exposure to capture both inner and outer corona. Imaging the corona with zoom will take a lot of time and effort and in my opinion isn't worth it. The problem is that most video cameras, even very expensive ones can't cope with the huge range of brightness.

But here's an easy method that requires very little attention that will leave you free to enjoy the eclipse and give you a good chance of success. I developed this method as a stand-alone set and forget method. It will work on practically any video device with a wide-angle lens.
Most video cameras do an excellent job of recording a very wide field view of an eclipse. Totality will be over exposed however the sky and the shadow of the moon travelling across the sky records beautifully.

1. If you can afford to, buy a screw on 0.5x wide-angle adaptor for an even better result. If not just set the lens to its widest-angle setting.
2. Set the camera to manual focus, focus on infinity.
3. Exposure to Auto.
4. Exposure compensation (if available) set to -1.5 eV.
5. Set the camera on a tripod or lean it against something.
6. Set the video camera low to the ground on a tripod behind you then it records you, your reactions during the eclipse and the shadows moving across the sky. Assess your surrounds, make sure nobody will steal the camera. If you are in a crowd, don't put it behind you. Keep it close in front of you.

Once again, the foreground will be dark, and your figure will be in silhouette so, don't waste too much of the frame real estate with the foreground. The horizon line can just be a thin strip along the ground. Filling the frame mostly with the sky will assist the camera's exposure system to expose the sky correctly. The shadow will approach from the west sometimes sweeping across from the northwest or the southwest. You could point the camera to the west away from the eclipsed Sun to capture the approaching shadow then swing the camera around to the east during totality or compromise.
You might like to shoot some short clips before the eclipse and during the partial phases. To shoot the partial phases, you can buy an extra pair of eclipse shades, cut them in half and tape one to the camera as a make do solar filter. Just remember to bring the tape with you. Over the years, I've found it wastes a lot of time if you go shopping around for mundane things like tape or glue. Much easier to bring it with you.
I usually start the continuous movie of totality about 1-2 minutes before the diamond ring (2nd contact). Stop it 1-2 mins after 3rd contact. This will give you a clip of 5-7 mins. You don't want to make a 2-hr movie with 3 mins of action in the middle. Nobody will want to look at it. With an ultrawide angle lens, you won't need a solar filter. Enjoy the eclipse and the camera will do all the work for you. Don't forget to talk about your experience during the eclipse so that it gets onto the soundtrack.

Here are three of my past video projects made using the above simple video method: -
Total eclipse Exmouth Australia, April 2023.

Total Eclipse, Andes, Argentina, July 2 2019


Total Eclipse through thin cloud, mid-Atlantic Ocean, November 2013

You will notice I didn’t manage to include myself in any of them, something I regret. Once the video recording was started, 1-2 mins before totality, I didn’t touch or worry about the camera until covering the lens 1-2 mins after totality.

Project 3. Handheld Telephoto shot
So, you've got a DSLR and a common 70-200mm f4 zoom lens, but you don't want to bring a tripod. Relax! You can still take some perfectly good handheld snap shots.

As I've already mentioned, the corona has a very wide brightness range. Eclipse photographers typically shoot one exposure at every shutter speed from 1/4000 to 4 or even 8 seconds. But these many exposures are taken to apply a special technique called stitching to the pictures later where all those exposures are combined. An exposure of 1/250s at f4 at ISO 400 will give you a decent shot of totality. If I had to take just one exposure to show totality this would be the exposure.

If your DSLR is a Sony, Pentax or Olympus, your camera has built-in image stabilization that works well with any lens or small refractor fitted to the camera and the image will be reasonably steady and sharp if you shoot within the stabilizer's limits. If it's a Canon or Nikon, then handheld at this shutter speed you'll get an acceptable image, but it might be a little soft unless you have one of their special image stabilized lenses. I've recommended a higher ISO for Canon / Nikon and a corresponding faster shutter speed to allow for Canon & Nikon camera bodies attached to non-stabilized lenses. The high ISO may result in a little more noise, but it is probably the best compromise.


Settings Summary
1. 200-300mm telephoto lens
2. ISO 100
3. Exposure manual
4. 1/750s f4
5. Image stabilizer ON (if available)
6. Autofocus might need to be turned off and manual focus used. The AF tends to hunt for focus but not find it with some camera models due to low light levels.
7. Use Liveview on maximum magnification to find focus.

Got a Tripod?
Use the above settings on a solid tripod and the picture will be even better!
Grab a photo or two using one of these methods, then put down the camera and make sure you take the time to enjoy looking at nature’s great spectacle.

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Joe Cali is an Australian astronomer, astrophotographer, and experienced eclipse chaser & photographer. Joe has chased fifteen total and 3 annular eclipses around the world over the past 30 years. His eclipse work has been published in high circulation magazines Australian Geographic, Sky and Telescope, and Australian Sky and Telescope, and on the web.
A large section of his personal website is devoted to solar eclipse chasing. https://joe-cali.com/eclipses/